Two Somerfield stores up for sale in Canvey and Wickford are off the market, bosses have confirmed.

The supermarkets, which between them employ 373 people, have been taken back because no-one was prepared to pay enough for them.

A Somerfield spokeswoman said: "They are very good stores with a very good turnover. We didn't receive an adequate bid for them.

"We always said if we didn't, we would continue with them. We were never going to close them down."

The company is keeping the stores as part of the Somerfield business and aims to concentrate on neighbourhood food retailing, fresh foods and improved customer services.

Future plans may also include franchises within the stores for things like dry cleaning.

Originally the company planned to sell some of its larger stores as part of its policy to concentrate on smaller top-up shopping stores where people nipped in two or three times a week for chilled meals and fresh food.

This was instead of trying to compete with other supermarket giants for the family trolley shop.

For this reason, smaller Somerfield stores at Rochford Road, Southend, and Laindon Centre, were never included in the planned sell-off.

Meanwhile, a former Kwik Save supermarket in Greyhound Way, Southend, which became Somerfield after a merger of the two companies, is set to be transferred in May to the company Lidl.

Somerfield has reversed plans to sell off 350 other Kwik Saves across the country.

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